Sky Atlantic HD introduces Lena Dunham’s GIRLS
“Flat-out ground-breaking, brilliant and hilarious” – The New York Post “Provocative, original and addictive” – The Daily Beast
“Worth all the fuss” – The New York Times
Created by and starring filmmaker Lena Dunham (Tiny Furniture) and co-executive produced by Judd Apatow (Bridesmaids, Knocked Up) and Jenni Konner (Help Me Help You, In The Motherhood), GIRLS premiered in the US earlier this month, attracting widespread critical acclaim with The Hollywood Reporter calling it a “brilliant gem” and New York Magazine declaring it “remarkably poignant” and “like nothing else on TV.”
The series takes a comic look at the assorted humiliations and rare triumphs of a group of girls – Hannah, Marnie, Jessa and Shoshanna - in their early 20s who, having lived in New York for a couple of years, Hannah, are still not sure what they want – from boys, from each other, from themselves. And things aren’t getting any clearer.
About the GIRLS:
Hannah (Lena Dunham, Tiny Furniture) is a unique mixture of self-entitlement and self-loathing. She believes she has the talent to be a successful writer, but forgets she has to write first. She wants to have a boyfriend without the obligations of a relationship, and a job without having to work. She’s ultimately good-natured, with a spirited sense of humour. But every time Hannah is about to improve her circumstances, her cluelessness undercuts her.
Marnie (Allison Williams, American Dreams), Hannah’s roommate and best friend, is a Type A personality with strict rules about friendship. She seems like Hannah’s opposite, because she’s got an actual job and a serious boyfriend. But while she’s more together on the surface, her unwillingness to admit how lost she is may mean that she’s the most lost.
Jessa (Jemima Kirke, Tiny Furniture) is a live-and-let-live bohemian who’s allergic to anything she views as bourgeois. She wants a life less ordinary and has travelled extensively. She’s had lots of different jobs and lots of different boyfriends, but her apparent lack of fear belies her own kind of insecurity. Jessa is apt to put crazy ideas in Hannah’s head that are easier for a gorgeous British girl to pull off than they are for anxious, rumpled Hannah.
Shoshanna (Zosia Mamet, Mad Men), Jessa’s roommate and cousin, aspires to the “Sex and the City” life. She’s an NYU student obsessed with “women’s issues,” gluten-free foods and sexcentric self-help. The others tend to underestimate her because she’s suburban and innocent, but Shoshanna can be a surprisingly incisive source of wisdom.
Lena Dunham directed five of the ten episodes of GIRLS. Other directors on the show include Jody Lee Lipes (cinematographer on Martha Marcy May Marlene and Tiny Furniture), Jesse Peretz (Our Idiot Brother) and Richard Shepard (The Matador, Emmy® winner for Ugly Betty). In addition to Dunham, who wrote or co-wrote every episode of the show, writers on GIRLS include Judd Apatow (Knocked Up), Bruce Eric Kaplan (Six Feet Under) and Jenni Konner (Help Me Help You, In the Motherhood, Undeclared).
GIRLS forms part of Sky Atlantic HD’s broader comedy strategy to bring the smartest, most engaging content of this genre from both sides of the Atlantic exclusively to Sky customers. The channel’s stellar comedy line-up also includes Armando Iannucci’s Veep, Brand X With Russell Brand and dark comedy House of Lies together with original commissions including Julia Davis’ Hunderby, Kathy Burke’s Walking & Talking and Adam Buxton’s Bug.
GIRLS will air this September exclusively on Sky Atlantic HD. Following the addition of Sky Atlantic HD to Sky Go, customers will be able to watch GIRLS on the move on iPad, selected smartphones and laptops at no extra cost.
ENDS
Notes to editor
For more information please contact:
Megan MacLeod
Publicist, Sky Movies and Sky Atlantic
T: +44 (0)20 7032 4252
M: +44 (0)7584 580 014
megan.macleod@bskyb.com
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Notes to Editors:
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